[2][3] Fitzgerald was born at Port Tobacco in Charles County, Maryland, on August 6, 1799.
In 1822, he married Elizabeth Wells, who was born near Clarksville, Tennessee.
[5][6] He was elected solicitor general of the sixteenth solicitorial district of Tennessee on November 25, 1826, which he held until he vacated the role on March 4, 1831.
[5][9] In 1861, he was nominated as a representative from Tennessee's ninth congressional district to attend a peace conference in 1861 in an effort to prevent the pending Civil War; Isaac Roberts Hawkins was elected to that role.
[10] Fitzgerald died at Paris, Tennessee, in March 1864 (age about 64 years).